What’s Amazon DynamoDB?

DynamoDB is one of the most recent services offered by Amazon.com. Announced on January 18, 2012, it is a fully managed NoSQL database service that provides fast and predictable performance along with excellent scalability.

The DynamoDB Environment only consists of using your Amazon Web Services account to access the DynamoDB GUI console, however, you can also perform a local install.

Navigate to the following website − https://aws.amazon.com/dynamodb/

Click the “Get Started with Amazon DynamoDB” button, or the “Create an AWS Account” button if you do not have an Amazon Web Services account. The simple, guided process will inform you of all the related fees and requirements.

After performing all the necessary steps of the process, you will have the access. Simply sign in to the AWS console, and then navigate to the DynamoDB console.

Let’s quickly analyze its positive and negative aspects in the lists below:

Advantages

The two main advantages of DynamoDB are scalability and flexibility. It does not force the use of a particular data source and structure, allowing users to work with virtually anything, but in a uniform way.

Its design also supports a wide range of use from lighter tasks and operations to demanding enterprise functionality. It also allows simple use of multiple languages: Ruby, Java, Python, C#, Erlang, PHP, and Perl.

Limitations

DynamoDB does suffer from certain limitations; however, these limitations do not necessarily create huge problems or hinder solid development.

You can review them from the following points

Capacity Unit Sizes − A read capacity unit is a single consistent read per second for items no larger than 4KB. A write capacity unit is a single write per second for items no bigger than 1KB.

Provisioned Throughput Min/Max − All tables and global secondary indices have a minimum of one read and one write capacity unit. Maximums depend on region. In the US, 40K read and write remains the cap per table (80K per account), and other regions have a cap of 10K per table with a 20K account cap.

Provisioned Throughput Increase and Decrease − You can increase this as often as needed, but decreases remain limited to no more than four times daily per table.

Table Size and Quantity Per Account − Table sizes have no limits, but accounts have a 256 table limit unless you request a higher cap.

Secondary Indexes Per Table − Five local and five global are permitted.